“The heroic books, even if printed in the character of our mother tongue, will always be in a language dead to degenerate times; and we must laboriously seek the meaning of each word and line, conjecturing a larger sense than common use permits out of what wisdom and valor and generosity we have.” -- Henry David Thoreau

About Me

Editor for publishing company by day; skald in the Hall of Fire by night; and member of the S.H.I.E.L.D.W.A.L.L.
Essayist and reviewer for numerous web and print-based fantasy publications, including The Cimmerian, Black Gate, Mythprint, REH: Two-Gun Raconteur, The Dark Man, and SFFaudio.com.

Saturday, October 2, 2010

Stupid, fat The Hobbit reporter!

I've got no problem with the meat of the article, and I've pretty much resigned myself to the fact that it will be a long time (if ever) before we see The Hobbit on screen (though we still have the Rankin and Bass version, which isn't such a bad thing). Still, this seems to be another shovel full of dirt on the project.

Where things get rather funny (and stupid) is the reporter trying to show that he's "down" and "jiggy" with Tolkien, when in fact he's obviously never read word one of the good professor's works:

It's also worth noting that the weakest scenes in the "Lord of the Rings" movies take place in the shire where the hobbits live; basing two whole movies on just hobbit-land would seem far from the financial slam-dunk that the previous three movies were.Come on dude, two whole movies on "hobbit-land"? Is this the same The Hobbit I read, where exactly ONE chapter ("An Unexpected Party") takes place in the Shire, before the action moves into the wild and a confrontation with trolls (Chapter 2: "Roast Mutton")? We barely get a whiff of "hobbit-land," and the rest of the action is a rousing series of adventures in the Misty Mountains, Mirkwood, the caves of the wood-elves, Laketown, the Lonely Mountain, the Battle of Five Armies, and then back home for what amounts to three pages in "hobbit-land."

If done right (or done at all), it's going to be mighty tough to screw up The Hobbit--it's almost pure adventure.

Also, "the weakest scenes in The Lord of the Rings take place in the shire"? You mean the wonderful scenes of friendship between Bilbo and Gandalf, leading to their confrontation over the One Ring, as portrayed by two great, perfectly-casted actors (Ian Holm and Ian McKellen)? Or the deft handling of "The Shadow of the Past" (which the screenplay wisely splits between the prologue and more superb Gandalf/Frodo dialogue at Bag-End)? Those weak scenes?

HAHAHAHAHA... Oh wow. What a silly, silly man. It actually kind of surprises me, because I would've thought this sort of thing wouldn't be done with something so beloved and well-known as The Hobbit. It's just unfortunate there's no comment section, as undoubtedly it would be filled with the protestations of rampaging Tolkienists.

Even with my problems with the films' handling of the Hobbits, they definitely weren't the weakest scenes. The weakest parts were the Fralippa fan fiction, as well as some of Jackson's more silly insertions (like the crumbling stair escapade in Moria which was clearly more important and necessary than, say, the Barrow Downs, apparently...)

Taranich: I hated the crumbling stair scene too, and now I fast-forward over the whole thing when I rewatch it. It's a cheap action CGI filler and is entirely unnecessary.

Dude: I have discussed the Scouring before and its ommission from the films. It's easy to see why Jackson did it, but it was still a painful cut, and that chapter contains an important message about one of the central themes of the book.

Atom Kid: Exactly.

Kent: Okay, so fat was a low-blow, but I was trying to riff off the Gollum line from the LOTR films.

No problem on the Williamson recommendation. I absolutely love his voice.

"Wonder had gone away, and he had forgotten that all life is only a set of pictures in the brain, among which there is no difference betwixt those born of real things and those born of inward dreamings, and no cause to value the one above the other."